SCC (Single chip crypto) product family and related physical security IP cores,
Passing extensive qualification exams and expanding Xilinx's leadership in aviation/defense applications

Xilinx Korea (Country Manager Ahn Heung-sik) September 15, 2010 – Xilinx announced that the latest version of its high-performance programmable solution for high-precision applications in the aerospace and defense industries has been approved by the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA) for use in Type 1 Crypto Systems. The certification of the Vertex®-5Q device for secure communications and the associated physical security IP core, which constitute the Xilinx® Target Design Platform, expands the ongoing relationship between the NSA and Xilinx and demonstrates Xilinx’s 20-year history of meeting the stringent demands of the aerospace and defense industries.

As a leader in FPGAs, Xilinx has been able to provide more flexible solutions with lower costs and power to developers who need to meet the demanding requirements of advanced cryptographic applications, including those defined by the Department of Defense (DoD) Crypto Modernization initiative, through the successful results of large-scale testing of its second-generation secure communications products.

This approval applies to key components of the Vertex-5Q secure communications target design platform. This solution provides single-chip crypto (SCC) design techniques and the newly announced Security Monitor 2.0 IP core for physical design security. SCC combines multiple FPGA functions into a single device, enabling aerospace and defense product developers to reduce system size, weight, power, and cost (SWAP-C) through high integration. In addition, this solution includes dual embedded PowerPC® 440 processors, tamper-proof features, and Xilinx's individual verification tools.

The key aspect of NSA certification is that the features and related techniques of the Vertex-5Q solution isolate user functions within a single device. By completing a failure-safety analysis of the Vertex-5Q family, the NSA confirmed that Xilinx’s SCC technology can isolate individual regions of the FPGA in the event of a failure. The verified SCC design and verification processes, developed for the first time by Xilinx in collaboration with the NSA, provide a higher level of integration and system reliability. While the SCC solution is designed to meet NSA requirements, it also demonstrates isolation techniques in other highly reliable applications, such as commercial avionics controlled by FAA DO-254 and commercial cryptographic systems controlled by NIST FIPS-140.

Amit Dhir, Senior Director of Xilinx’s Aerospace, Defense, and High Performance Computing business unit, said, “Xilinx and N